


ai tombom ste yun

by agetwellcard



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/F, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-28
Updated: 2016-02-28
Packaged: 2018-05-23 15:35:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6121129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/agetwellcard/pseuds/agetwellcard
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Lexa,” Clarke huffs, sitting up in bed. “Come on, what does it mean?” </p><p>(AKA Clarke learning Trigedasleng fic)</p>
            </blockquote>





	ai tombom ste yun

**Author's Note:**

> i've been learning french for the past few months, and have obviously found out how hard it is to learn a language and all that goes into it. and i've been thinking about clarke learning trigedasleng and how the show didn't really show much of the learning process (which is fair). so this is my take on it.
> 
> also, hopefully the trigedasleng words and grammar are correct (oh, the irony if not) because i used that translator site and read a few articles on the language.

Trigedasleng is a lot like English, Clarke finds.

She learns it quickly, having first heard the foreign words uttered by Lexa and her people. After a while, though, she’s immersed in the language, and there are no quick translations by friends. The only thing she can do is learn to speak the language.

And she does.

The thing is, it will never be her native language, and there will always be something missing when she speaks. Maybe it’s her accent, or the way she has to enunciate each word carefully, unlike all the natives that sloppily string words together.

When she talks to Lexa, though, her English is nearly perfect. She never makes mistakes and Clarke can’t even discern her from someone from the Arc. This is why there is some pressure on Clarke when she does speak in Trigedasleng to Lexa.

One day, she’s practicing, Lexa half-listening as she lies on the couch, eyes closed. Clarke is mostly just saying whatever comes to her head, stringing sentences together of words she knows.

Lexa stops her, though, eyes flickering open. “It’s _oso_ ,” she tells Clarke firmly. “Not _osir_.”

“Oh.” Clarke thinks back to the sentence and nods her head, feeling her face heat up. “I knew that.”

Eyes watching Clarke, Lexa smirks a little. “Don’t take it so hard, Clarke.”

Clarke is looking down at her hands, her ears now hot too. “It’s just – Everyone is waiting for me to mess up. If I’m part of the coalition I have to speak the language. And stupid mistakes…” she trails on, looking up to Lexa.

“You’re fine. You say what you need to say. And if you can’t, say it in English.”

From the couch, Lexa is smiling a little still, reassuring Clarke even more. She feels the heat in her cheeks dissipate. “Yeah,” she mutters.

The conversation seems like it’s over, and Clarke is about to start speaking in Trigedasleng again, but then Lexa opens her mouth to speak, closes it, and then finally goes, “Plus, I think it’s kind of… _cute_ sometimes. When you don’t know a word. And you do that face – “

“Cute?” Clarke says, laughing a little.

Lexa shrugs in that way that tells Clarke that that’s exactly what she thinks it is.

“Should I start making more mistakes,” Clarke asks playfully, “so I can be more cute?”

Clarke and Lexa look at each other and smile, Lexa shaking her head, making both of them laugh.

***

Lexa becomes a different person with each language she speaks, Clarke has noticed.

When she is speaking Trigedasleng, she sits up straighter and her voice is more commanding. Her shoulders will round out, spine completely straight as she sits at her throne giving orders or planning projects. Her voice will get lower and her words will be more effective. Even when she’s helping the children, she’ll speak to them like adults.

In English, Lexa is just as commanding, but in a different way. She’ll lean back and say little comments to Clarke that she knows no one else in the room will understand. Everyone will still listen to her, though, even if they are unsure of her words. She’ll smile more and talk softer in English, her words like afterthoughts that are just as interesting as all the rest.

Clarke isn’t sure how different she sounds when speaking, but she’s fascinated when Lexa starts speaking whatever tongue she’s chosen at that moment.

***

Clarke wakes to the room ablaze with light. She blinks a few too many times as her eyes adjust, the world seeping in through the windows. It’s only after she’s rubbed her eyes that she realizes Lexa is already awake, eyes watching her carefully.

“Morning,” Clarke whispers, voice hoarse with sleep.

She stretches, moving closer to Lexa, chin resting on her shoulder, head tipped back so she can see her face. Lexa doesn’t say anything back, but she does wrap an arm around Clarke, fingers slowly making patterns on the skin of Clarke’s arm. She knows Clarke is especially fond of this.

“Are you going to miss me?” Clarke asks.

She’s visiting Arcadia for a day, Octavia taking the trip to come and retrieve her, like she is a child and can’t find her way there. Clarke knows that Lexa has been worried about the visit since the plans were made.

Almost automatically, Lexa goes, “ _Sha_.”

Clarke smiles at the way she sometimes slips back into her mother tongue without even realizing it. Clarke thinks maybe it’s a bit sweet that her response is so quick that her brain won’t even let her translate it to English. “ _Mochof_ ,” Clarke says in return.

Lexa crinkles her eyebrows, looking down on Clarke’s face now. “Why are you thanking me?”

“It’s nothing,” Clarke hums.

“Are you making fun of me?” Lexa asks, the corners of her lips turned up just slightly.

Placing a quick kiss on Lexa’s cheek, Clarke says, “ _Sha_.”

Lexa smiles fully now, shaking her head and looking up to the ceiling.

“Ai hod yu in otaim,” Clarke tells her after a few seconds of thought. _I love you always._

Laughing, she goes, “ _Chof_.”

“ _Pro_.” _You’re welcome_.

“You’re an expert at my language now?” Lexa asks, seamlessly switching back to English.

“I’ve always been a good student.”

A few seconds pass where Lexa’s fingers still make circles on her arm and the sounds from a waking Polis seeping in from outside liven up the room. Lexa is warm next to Clarke, and their feet are just barely touching from under the blankets.

Clarke is suddenly stumped as to how Lexa could think love is a weakness. She knows why, sure, but at this very moment, the two of them in their own world and so happy, the thought seems absurd. She can’t imagine ever thinking of this feeling, the one that makes her whole chest go warm, as one that is a _weakness_.

“Dison nou ste kwelnes.”

_This is no weakness._

Lexa looks down to her again, face placid. Clarke knows she understands, though. She doesn’t need to say anything, in any language for them to understand that maybe this is a weakness, but also strength at the same time.

Clarke isn’t expecting Lexa to quietly go, “ _Ai tombom ste yun.”_

She pauses, racking her brain for the translation. Lexa isn’t meeting her eyes. “ _Tombom_?” Clarke repeats, the word not sounding the same when she says it.

“ _Tombom_ ,” Lexa repeats for Clarke to hear it again.

Clarke says the word to herself a few times, testing out the way it sounds to her ears. “What does it mean?”

Lexa doesn’t give anything away as she untangles herself from the covers and Clarke. She’s putting on her shirt when she says, “Get ready. You have to meet Octavia.”

“ _Lexa_ ,” Clarke huffs, sitting up in bed. “Come on, what does it mean?”

Throwing Clarke’s shirt on her lap, Lexa smiles and shrugs her shoulders playfully.

After more coercing, Lexa still won’t tell Clarke what it means so she ends up thinking about it on the walk to find Octavia, thinking maybe she’s just temporarily forgot the translation and it will come back at any moment. It doesn’t, though, and by the time that Clarke and Octavia are on their way to Arcadia, horses side by side, Clarke bursts out, “What does _tombom_ mean?”

Octavia cocks her head, smiling a little. “How was it used?”

Clarke thinks for a moment and then says, “ _Ai tombom ste yun.”_

“Oh,” Octavia says, laughing a little. She looks back to her horse and nods.

“So you know what it means?”

“Yeah.”

Clarke huffs. “Tell me.”

“Um,” Octavia says thoughtfully, “It’s basically saying ‘my heart is yours’. It’s just another way of saying I love you…but _differently_.”

Clarke can’t help the smile that spreads on her face.

During her visit, Lexa’s words stay in her mind. She thinks about it almost too much, so once she arrives back to Polis, waiting for a quiet moment with Lexa feels like it takes forever. Once it happens, though, the two of them left alone for the night, Clarke wastes no time.

She walks up to Lexa and kisses her, both hands on either side of Lexa’s face.

“ _Ai tombom ste yun seintaim_.”

_My heart is yours also._


End file.
